WAINAMOINEN'S BOAT-BUILDING
WAINAMOINEN started to build a boat from the Rainbow-maiden's distaff, but he had soon used up all his timber, and the boat was far from finished. So he asked Sampsa (the planter of the first trees that grew on earth) to go and search out the needful timber in order to finish the boat.
Sampsa started off with a golden axe upon his shoulder and a copper hatchet in his belt. He wandered through the mountain forests, and at length came upon a great aspen, and was just going to cut it down, when the aspen asked him what he wanted. 'I wish to take your timber for a vessel,' Sampsa replied, 'that the wise magician Wainamoinen is building.' Then the aspen answered: 'All the boats that have been made of my wood have been[p. 87] but failures; they float but a little way, and then sink to the ocean's bottom, for my trunk is full of hollow places, where the worms have eaten my wood.'
So Sampsa left the aspen and searched still further, until he came to a pine-tree that was even taller than the aspen was. Sampsa struck a blow with his axe, and at the same time asked the pine-tree if it would furnish good timber for Wainamoinen's boat. But the pine-tree answered: 'All the ships that have been made from me are useless. I am full of imperfections, for the ravens live among my branches and bring ill-luck.'
And Sampsa was obliged to leave the pine-tree and go on until he came to a tremendous oak-tree, whose trunk was thicker than the height of even the tallest men. And he asked the oak-tree if it would furnish wood for Wainamoinen's boat. 'I will gladly furnish the wood,' replied the oak-tree, 'for I am tall and sound and strong. The warm sun shines upon me for three months in the summer, and the sacred cuckoo dwells in my branches and brings good fortune.' So Sampsa quickly felled the oak, and brought the timber, skilfully hewn, to Wainamoinen.
The wise magician Wainamoinen then began to put his boat together by the aid of magic spells. The first magic song that[p. 88] he sang joined the framework together, and the second song fastened the planking into the ribs, and the third put the rowlocks in place and made the oars. But, alas! when all this was done, there were still three magic words needed to complete the stem and stern and bulwarks.
Wainamoinen saw that all his labour was in vain unless he found the three magic words, for unless the stern and stem were fastened and the bulwarks built, the boat could never put to sea. He pondered long over where he might find the lost words, and after a while he concluded that they might be found in the brains of swallows and the heads of swans and the plumage of the sea-duck. But though he killed great numbers of these birds, he could not find the three lost words. Then he thought that he might find them on the tongues of reindeers or of the squirrels; but though he killed great numbers of them, and found many words on their tongues, the three lost words were not there.
Then he said to himself: 'I will seek the lost words in the kingdom of Manala; there are countless words to be found there in the Deathland.' So off he went, travelling for three weeks over hill and dale, through marshes and thickets, until at length he came to the river of Tuoni. There he called out in a voice like thunder: 'Bring a boat,[p. 89] O daughter of Tuoni, and ferry me over this black and fatal river.'